Thursday 19 July 2012 16.30 EDT
First published on Thursday 19 July 2012 16.30 EDT

Psychogeography-lite is one way of describing this film by Andrew Kötting, the indulgent record of a gloriously daft journey the film-maker took in the company of author Iain Sinclair. They travel from Hastings beach to Hackney, round the coast and then north and east, via various circuitous waterways — in a pedalo shaped like a swan. They were perhaps inspired by the seagoing pedalo scene in Sylvain Chomet's Belleville Rendez-Vous (2003). Kötting never changes his suit and often climbs into the muddy water wearing it. Why? And where do they sleep when night falls? In a tent? Or do they seek out a nice little Premier Inn? Who knows?

Anyway, there they are, pedalling industriously away together. Part of their mission is to bring a defiant message of ambulatory freedom to the grim corporate compound that is the Olympic Park, and renew Sinclair's protests about how the Olympic behemoth was foisted on local communities in east London. It is also to intuit and celebrate the occult resonances and connections within the landscape — in the traditional and now very familiar psychogeographic style. There are some wonderful, unexpected images of wilderness and l'Angleterre profonde.

But the point is also to have a bit of a laugh. The film draws upon the influences of Jerome K Jerome and also Cervantes, but it is also resembles a jokey stunt, like Tony Hawks's Round Ireland with a Fridge, or Griff Rhys Jones's To the Baltic With Bob. More conventionally shot, this movie could form a three-part TV show. The movie features guest spots from comedian Stewart Lee, who is permitted to poke some gentle fun at Iain Sinclair's proprietorial attitude to London.

In other circumstances, this eccentric journey undertaken by two self-aware middle-aged men might prove highly revealing. We might find out a lot about them; why they are doing this and what they find out about themselves at the conclusion of their "journey". But part of the charm of this film is that they are opaque and unreadable. People in big launches and boats whoosh by them and derisively stick two fingers up. Someone, I am sorry to say, shouts out: "Wankers!" They cheerfully take all this in their pedalo stride. Sinclair, whose prose is famously so eloquent, is here smilingly reticent, and somewhat disconcertingly absents himself before the trip is quite finished – to catch a plane. It is a bit of a vanity project: but the sight of these two guys and their great big swan is surreal and funny.